The Bharatiya Janata Party has approached the Lok Sabha Speaker with a complaint against Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi over his ‘fair and lovely’ remark in the House on Wednesday. The ruling party is expected to move a motion on ‘racism’ in the House when it convenes on Tuesday, March 8. Lok Sabha proceedings were suspended for the day after the death of former Lok Sabha Speaker PA Sangma. He was 68. Sangma served the sixteenth Lok Sabha as its Speaker from 1996 to 1998. He also remained the Chief Minister of Meghalaya from 1988 to 1990.

Yesterday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi went on to launch a veiled, yet powerful, attack on the Congress and its vice-president Rahul Gandhi over the recent allegations on the government.

“I have been getting certificates for the past 14 years, even accused. I have learnt to live with it,” the PM said in an apparent reference to the aftermath of 2002 Gujarat riots.

Admonishing the Congress for continued disruptions and the consequent washout of recent sessions, Modi also made Rajiv Gandhi a point of reference during his 75-minute-long speech on Thursday.

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The BJP has reacted strongly to Rahul Gandhi mentioning Savarkar in his speech in the Lok Sabha on Wednesday. “I said Gandhi is ours, Veer Savarkar is yours, am I wrong? Have you discarded Savarkar?” Rahul Gandhi had asked BJP legislators.

BJP member Kirit Somaiya has sought an apology from Rahul Gandhi for his “derogatory” remarks against Savarkar and also lodged a complaint with Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan.

Somaiya told the Speaker that the Congress vice-president must apologise in the Lok Sabha for “insulting” Savarkar while participating in the Motion of Thanks to the President’s address to Parliament.

“Veer Savarkar is a national hero and a great freedom fighter. Parliament has already recognised his contribution by installing his portrait in the Central Hall,” Somaiya, BJP MP from Northeast Mumbai, said in the letter.

“I don’t know anything, I don’t understand anything. I listen to the people, understand them and then speak on those issues in the House,” Gandhi had said, adding “I am not from the RSS. I make mistakes.”

The BJP will also be moving a notice against Rahul Gandhi for using ‘racist’ fair and lovely remark in his speech in the Lok Sabha. LJP chief Ramvilas Paswan, his son Chirag have also complained to the Lok Sabha Speaker in this regard.

“Rahul Gandhi mocked the disclosure scheme of the government of India by terming it as a ‘fair and lovely scheme”. The advertisement of Fair and Lovely has been banned by the Supreme Court because it is racist in nature,” BJP MP Arjun Meghwal said.

“The Modi government launched a fair and lovely’ yojana, to convert black money into white. Modi ji had promised that he will put people with black money behind bars, now they have come up with way to save those people,” Rahul had said in Lok Sabha on Wednesday.

Former BJP leader and senior lawyer Ram Jethmalani has claimed that Rahul Gandhi’s ‘fair and lovely’ jibe to explain the government’s amnesty to black money holders was first used by him five years ago.

“I had used this term in an article written about the amnesty scheme in 2011. I am happy Rahul is using my phrase and reading what I had written,” Jethmalani, who was removed from the BJP last year for anti-party activities, told reporters.